We often hear many preach that one should not do rituals but rather only meditation to reach God faster. Lets address this topic in this article.
Oxford dictionary states meaning of Ritual as:
a religious or solemn ceremony consisting of a series of actions performed according to a prescribed order
Its verbiage doesn't reserve it only for external worship but rather any guided steps intended to take us closer to God. Whether one uses external objects to attain that purpose has less of significance than what the end result is- feeling of oneness with object of our attention.
One's mental maturity and control over their Mind is what determines which means are better suited to comprehend God. Many can relate to the fact that in this current age, where we have to commute to office/business and deal with its demands before returning home tired sets a challenging prelude for meditation. Residual mental momentum we carry-over from work makes it difficult to concentrate on things spiritual or mundane alike. Daily digital lifestyles and its distractions makes many of us more analytical with short-spanned attentions and less of clean mind that's needed to attain promised results of meditation techniques.
In olden days, Religious rituals like worship, bhajans and japa were designed for Householders and Sadhus alike living in society so that they can attain blessings from the Gods and live harmoniously. Articles recommended for use are easily available in their neighborhood ranging from milk, ghee etc from their Cows to Coconuts from their backyard. When one attains enough maturity and renunciation to a point that social interaction becomes a hurdle on their path to God, they depart to forests and immerse themselves in deep meditation and ignore basic needs of body. This is real and natural meditation that excludes all distractions effortlessly. With added complexities to our live-styles since dawn of Industrial revolution, it goes without saying that these modes of sadhana are even more relevant now than days of lore.
Fire ceremonies are one of a kind ritual that both Householders and highly attained Rishis living in forests involve periodically (based on astrological situations) due to its immense benefits for their sadhana, nature and humanity at large.
In other words, Meditation is a state-of-mind and not a process to rub upon our minds with eyes closed. 'Visualization' word comes close to what most people do in the name of meditation techniques, which in itself is very effective means that all modes of worship begin with visualizing the form/formless God. Even acts like sitting silent and watching our thoughts or breath are still a form of ritual called 'Observation'. These may lead to momentary peace from our thoughts but our vasanas (habitual thoughts/acts) ambush us again in no time. Seeking aid of higher Divine beings and subtle power of Mantras makes our journey easier and joyful.
In other words, Meditation is a state-of-mind and not a process to rub upon our minds with eyes closed.
This is not to say that householders shouldn't attempt at attaining meditative states like Rishis. In fact, when one falls in complete love with an object of their desire like earning money, painting, driving etc, they're already touching some levels of meditative states albeit fully conscious of their physical body with eyes wide open. When one attains perfection in their trade to an extent that they can do it with minimal effort inspite of distractions (commonly connoted as- 'he/she can do it even with eyes closed') that's a sign that they've mastered it ! Same thing applies to spirituality too.
During worship, Devotees offer precious items like ornaments, food etc to God that they possess with care and respect. Upon daily practice, they develop the attitude of seeing and offering everything to God without reservation thereby enjoying fruits promised by scriptures. Wiser sadhus soon realize that only real fruit worth pursuing is none other than God himself and pursue their search wholeheartedly and cut chains off their vicious cycle of birth-and-death.
Primary goal of sadhana is to dissolve objects within our minds that comes between us and Truth. Journey begins by offering external objects first, which are but a reflection of what's inside us, before proceeding onto mental offering that eventually leads to unhindered meditative states of mind upon practice.
Without focus, a meditation too becomes a ritual of no intrinsic value. With devotion, any ritual concludes with natural meditative states as seen in saints like Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa. Key here is to 'understand' what we do and why we do so we don't space out and start day-dreaming during our sadhana. Relatively recent religions like Buddhism that originally discouraged external worship too ended-up embracing them later (through its offshoots like Vajrayana) realizing their importance.
Without focus, a meditation too becomes a ritual of no intrinsic value. With devotion, any ritual elevates to natural meditative states.
- Swami Pranavananda
Comments